Italian football (soccer) officially starts in 1898. In order to honor the champion of the league, Italian Football Federation decided to present a "Scudetto" or a small shield which marked the current Champion with a small picture of a shield with the Italian flag all throughout the following season making Italian football history as "Scudetto" is what is presented to today's league champion.

ΣΚΑΝΔΑΛΑ - Match Fixing Scandals.

The first scandal of Italian football history was the stripping of Torino's Championship Title due to match fixing back in 1927.

Another Torino scandal tainted the great Italian soccer history 79 years later, this time it involved another Torin based team "Juventus".

This time around Juventus Torino was punished by being stripped of Two Championship Titles and relegated to second division because of match fixing which not only tainted the history of soccer in Italy but other soccer clubs as well according to Italian football history.

The scandal also involved other teams that were punished by starting the following season with a large deficit in points. Teams involved were Fiorentina, Lazio and AC Milan.

Italian football history had also been marked by the tragic death of Torino players and staff traveling on the plane that crashed in 1948. Although the season was not over, the Italian Football Federation awarded Torino the "Scudetto" or "The Shield" .

Seria A is among the most competative leagues in the world.

Italian teams that have a rich and long history of Italian soccer as well as winning many European titles are AC Milan, Lazio, Juventus, Fiorentina, AS Roma and Internazionale Milan.

The traditional colour of the national team (as well as all Italian national teams and athletes officially representing Italy) is azure blue[1] (azzurro, in Italian), due to the "Azzurro Savoia" (Savoy Blue), the colour traditionally linked to the royal dynasty which unified Italy in 1861, and maintained in the official standard of the Italian